Mena Today

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban and his Fidesz party face their first closely contested election on April 12 after four consecutive landslide victories since 2010. 

Lebanon's President Joseph Aoun has called for historic direct talks with longtime foe Israel since war erupted a month ago - a month in which Israel's military has forced more than a million Lebanese to flee, levelled parts of Beirut and triggered sectarian friction.

Iran’s Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf on Friday called for a ceasefire in Lebanon and the unfreezing of Iranian assets as conditions for any peace negotiations with the United States, as talks are expected to take place Saturday in Pakistan.

Israeli and Lebanese officials are expected to meet in Washington next week as U.S. President Donald Trump seeks to calm weeks of Israeli fighting with Iran-backed Hezbollah that has threatened to derail a fragile U.S.-Iran ceasefire. 

Art Paris runs through Sunday at the Grand Palais (Paris), gathering dozens of international galleries and hundreds of artists under one roof,  from established names to emerging voices, from every corner of the world.

Vice President JD Vance said on Friday he was looking forward to having positive negotiations with Iran as he left for talks in Pakistan with a warning to Tehran not to "play us."

There is an unwritten rule in any self-respecting chancellery: before commenting on a complex military operation in a region you do not understand, make sure you know what you are talking about. Jean-Noël Barrot, France's Foreign Minister, appears never to have heard of it.

The Strait of Hormuz remained shut on Friday and Israel traded fire with Hezbollah in Lebanon, which the United States and Iran each described as violations of their ceasefire deal on the eve of their first peace talks of the war.

Attacks on Saudi energy facilities have cut the kingdom's oil production capacity by around 600,000 barrels per day and throughput on its East-West Pipeline by about 700,000 bpd, Saudi state news agency SPA reported on Thursday, citing an official source at the Ministry of Energy.

Ukraine is in talks with Oman, Kuwait and Bahrain to cooperate in the security sector and share its drone defence expertise and technology, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said.

Hezbollah lawmaker Ali Fayyad said on Thursday that the group rejected direct negotiations with Israel and that the Lebanese government should demand a ceasefire as a precondition before any further steps are taken.

Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel told NBC News that the country has asked U.S. President Donald Trump's administration to engage in dialogue without demanding changes from Cuba's political system or imposing other conditions, the network said on Thursday.